


Self-Defense

by Browa123



Series: Tumblr Promptz [5]
Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: Gen, Mother-Son Relationship, Oneshot, Reveal Fic, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-28
Updated: 2019-02-28
Packaged: 2019-11-07 03:33:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,862
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17952836
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Browa123/pseuds/Browa123
Summary: When Danny comes home injured for another night in a row, Maddie decides she's had enough and teaches him to defend himself with her backing in martial arts. Problem is, Danny's actually good at this. Suspiciously good.





	Self-Defense

"Where on earth did you get that black eye, young man?"

Maddie roars this furiously as she inspects her obviously injured son. She couldn't help but feel worried, as moments like these were becoming much more frequent. It seemed like almost every night now, Danny would come home with a new bruise, a new cut and even a limp on a rare occasion.

"I'm fine mom. It's just another bullying incident at school, I'll live," Danny replies to her tiredly, moving away from her discerning look. He'd grown quieter and more withdrawn too, and seemed distant now more so than ever. A result of the so called bullying excuse he continues to come up with? Maddie isn't buying it anymore.

"Daniel James Fenton, this is becoming a problem! I can't remember a night in the past month you haven't come home injured," the authority in her tone fades as she watches her son's brow crease with annoyance. Her own expression furrows as they lock tired eyes.

"I said I'm fine. I can handle it," Danny breaks his gaze from her, moving away from her. He steps to move away and storm off in a moody manner, but Maddie instead grabs his shoulder.

"You most certainly can't! Look at you, Danny! You're wounded almost every day for reasons I can't get out of you! This is more than just some bully at school doing this to you, young man!" she desperately tries to get him to see her point, but he jerks away from her again. Maddie feels her resolve settle, because this has gone on long enough.

"I'm giving you self defense lessons tomorrow," she states. He hears the boy in front of her stutter, trying to find a protest to that. "No excuses, mister. With how closed off you've been in the past few months, I know you're not going to tell me what's really going on. But, this is for your own good. I'm keeping you out of school tomorrow and we'll be in the lab training bright and early."

"But mom-!"

"What did I say? No buts young man. Now get some rest, I'll see you in the morning," the huntress says with finality, watching her son head upstairs to his room. With him now out of earshot, she sighs.

"What's going on with you, Danny?"

-

It's a bright morning when Maddie wakes up, feeling a bit more calm after a night's rest. Her rest was plagued with worry over her still injured son, but she found it in her to shove aside those worries and prepare for today.

She spots Danny eating breakfast downstairs and shoots him a smile, which in turn goes ignored by her son. He turns his head away from her with a pout and Maddie feels a hole in her chest as a result. What had she done to make him this distant?

"Morning, Danny. How was your sleep?" she prompts him, attempting to strike up a conversation. He turns to her, dull blue eyes meeting her own indigo ones for a brief moment. He looks away just as quickly.

"Fine," he replies noncommittally. Maddie frowns in turn, not liking the attitude. But, there's little she can do to stop it nowadays.

"Meet me in the lab when you'e finished breakfast, okay? And don't skip out. I've already called the school to say you're not coming," she tells him in turn, a bit disheartened once again. This might be all she can do for him at this point. With that, she heads to the lab herself in order to set everything up.

Bless Jack, helping with making these early stage training dummies. Maddie herself never thought she'd have the kids use them in the end, but it's about time they were put to good use instead of collecting dust in the wall. They were soft padded, so that when they "attacked" so to speak, the receiver only gets knocked over at worst. The last thing she needed is someone getting hurt in training.

A few minutes later, Danny appears in the doorway of the lab. He's slouching as usual as he heads down the stairs to meet his mother for combat training. He looks annoyed and a little exasperated, but beggars can't be choosers. Maddie will just have to put up with this new attitude if she wants to help her son.

Wait... didn't he have a black eye last night? Maddie trails her gaze back to his face, taking in the eye that had previously been injured and swelling, only to find it back to normal, coloration and all. How did his injury recover so fast? How had she never noticed how fast he recovers before now?

She can ask him later. Right now, she has some things for her son to do today. It's a beginner's course of her own design, for a few punches, kicks and dodges. It's mostly to measure skill level, and knowing her son as well as she does, she's not expecting too much for his first day of training.

"Alright, Danny? I want you to hit that training dummy with as hard a punch as you can," Maddie instructs. As low as Danny can start on his first day, Maddie knows he'll pick up on things fast. In turn, Danny looks at the dummy and gives it a half-hearted jab in the gut. Maddie frowns, knowing that he's not even trying.

"Danny sweety, please. We can't start until I learn what you already know how to do!" she begs him, locking indigo with blue once again. Desperate he'd listen to her, Maddie holds the pleading stare as long as she can.

Danny moves his eyes to his feet a minute, ashamed, before facing the dummy. He actually winds his arm back this time, making a more stable stance before launching his fist into the padded face of the dummy before him. There's a tearing and snapping noise, as the plastic and fabric holding the figure's head in place shatters on impact with Danny's fist. It falls off and rolls sadly on the floor.

Both mother and son are wide eyed at what just happened, before Danny moves his hand to his forehead and starts muttering under his breath. Maddie looks between the broken dummy and her son, dumbstruck herself. She wasn't expecting that!

"Danny?"

"Yeah mom?"

"Where did you learn to put that much force into your punches?"

"I don't know mom..."

She doesn't buy this either. Something is definitely afoot here, and the mother is now determined to find out what it is. She steels her posture and meets the blue eyed gaze of her son once more.

"Fight me."

"Um... excuse me?" Danny looks dumbfounded at the statement, but Maddie isn't backing down from this.

"It's obvious the dummies aren't going to be a good measure. Square up Danny, and fight me," she repeats, taking a defensive stance while Danny stutters.

"Fight YOU? But mom! You're like, a ninth-degree black belt! You'll kick my a... butt! I meant butt...." Danny stutters, looking nervous.

"Nice save, but this is for your own good. And don't worry, I'll be holding back until I can match your skill level," Maddie assures, preparing herself for the battle with her son. She'd never hurt her baby, but there's something she needs to find out. How good he is, and just plain how in general.

Danny squares his shoulders and takes his own defensive stance, moving to stare down his mother once more. Nervous as he looks, he appears somewhat confident in this atmosphere.

"Alright, now come at me," Maddie commands, and Danny swiftly comes across the room at her. She almost doesn't have time to block with how fast he paced her, but she still catches the jab in her own hand, feeling the force in her arm. She grabs the other arm that had come for her, and pushes Danny backward.

"Rule one, young man. Never make the first strike," she chides as she swings her leg at him. Danny's eyes widen as he ducks under the attack and moves in with a kick of his own. As good as he appeared to be, Maddie still spots the obvious weaknesses in his posture and blocks and counters accordingly, with practiced ease. 

By the end of it all, Danny is on the ground and the both of them are breathing heavily. "Where... did you learn that stuff, young man?" Maddie asks, befuddled. Danny pushes himself up to his elbows.

"Self-taught..." he mutters. A half truth, but it seemed to be the best Maddie would get for now. It's obvious self-defense isn't the problem here, but there's still something fishy going on with how her son knows so much. 

From that day forth, she had arranged lessons in the lab every Saturday, in an attempt to learn what was up with Danny having these unexplained skills. And, well, it felt good to do something with her son again. She learned to understand his fighting style rather quickly, seeing as he opted for speed rather than power when in combat. How wise!

-

She didn't understand the implications of what these lessons would lead to, until she was caught one day in a fight with the ever infamous Phantom. 

The ghost was grounded for the time being, leaving Maddie to charge in against what should have been an inept blob of post-human consciousness. Phantom didn't have an obsession with close combat involved, so it should have been easy to overpower the flightless spook.

But again, Phantom had caught her off guard. He was fast, very fast, when moving to counter the huntress's attacks. He was swift to maneuver around her fighting style, like he already knew it. His own was way too familiar to Maddie in turn, under the fact that a ghost like Phantom shouldn't know martial arts in the first place. She moves to kick him in that constantly smug face of his, he ducks under her leg and winds up a kick of his own. 

And in that moment, she's not fighting Phantom anymore.

She sees Danny, shining through in Phantom in just the most brief moments before his attack actually connects with her hip, forcing her backward. She hears Phantom's, Danny's labored and exhausted breaths before her. With Danny in her mind over Phantom, things begin to click.

After all, Danny has the same black eye Phantom is sporting right now. His jumpsuit, aside the tacky logo, had always been familiar. Danny's white one had vanished one day years ago, and white haired Phantom had a black jumpsuit. Even his fighting style, which had chosen speed over power was one to one with her son.

Phantom takes her obvious stupor as a chance to escape, and quickly turns on his heel to leave. Without his powers, he can't fly after all. But Maddie can't let him get away.

"Daniel James Fenton," she hisses at him, causing him to freeze, turning to her with a newfound terror in his luminescent green eyes. She sighs at him, shaking her head.

"Where on earth did you get that black eye, young man?"


End file.
